


Oh, Take me Back to the Start

by Alliance (Xazz)



Series: Cypress Hall [1]
Category: Flight Rising
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-19
Updated: 2018-06-19
Packaged: 2019-05-25 05:34:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,624
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14970173
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Xazz/pseuds/Alliance





	Oh, Take me Back to the Start

The old skydancer was tired. Defeated even. Her armor wasn’t so shining, her feathers askew, one antenna bent a way it probably shouldn’t. [Johanna](http://flightrising.com/main.php?p=lair&id=332919&tab=dragon&did=172145) had served loyally for so many years she wasn’t used to being treated with scorn and distrust. But that is what had happened. The Dragonlord had no use for her, and didn’t trust her. After that last fight with the Crumbled, she’d decided to just ‘die’. It was easy to fake your death when those traitorous oath breakers, egg breaking, scoundrels had made sure everyone they could get ahold of had been ripped apart before they’d made their retreat. Johanna had been injured during it and had just laid down. Her flank still hurt. Her healing magic wasn’t as strong as it once had been. When the Crumbled forces had given chase, leaving her behind she’d waited for someone to come back. No one did. Either they’d killed each other or were still chasing her paladins.

As it often did in the dense jungles of the Labyrinth it had started to rain and a sprinkling of rain had broken through the thick canopy to splash across her face. No one would come back for her unless they had time to come bury her or the others’ corpses. She’d gotten to her feet with a groan and limped the opposite direction, away from the heart of the Labyrinth, away from the Clan. Away from her duty. Away from her old life.

She hadn’t looked back.

She was far from the Labyrinth now and she meant to get even further. She wanted to return home, to the Plateau. Her young aunt would welcome her home, surely? But to return home having forsaken her duty? To abandon the Dragonlord and the war? Anastasia might not be forgiving but Johanna had to hope. She had entered the Sunbeam Ruins a few days ago after skirting the coast of the Tangled Wood and was making her slow way along the edge of the Dusk Break where a nearly sheer cliff of tectonic might mad fallen away to separate the Ruins from the Wood. The flight across the Twilight Straits had taken it out of her and the wound in her flank was greatly aggravated and she’d found a heavy sprain in her wing. The transformation back into a dragon had nearly taken all of her strength and she’d had to leave her armor behind and she had to walk along the ground. She made a truly pathetic sight.

At least the Ruins was, for the most part, flatland along its western border once you made it past the Climb, the precariously steep staircase that allowed for foot traffic between the two regions and had different names depending on which god’s domain you were in. In the distance, she could see the thick conifer forest that much of the ruins that gave the Sunbeam Ruins their name resided in. She was much too far to see any of the buildings but the forest covered nearly the entire upper half of the territory so it was impossible to miss.

She did not meet many clans on her walk along the rim of cliffs. Light clans wanted nothing to do with being so close to the Wood and Shadow clans found the searing light that came from over the Dusk Break much too harsh for their eyes. So she was alone with her thoughts for days on her slow, limping, walk. She grazed on tender grasses and she went and when she could snapped up a cricket or butterfly. Eating raw food wasn’t her favorite thing but she made do with what she had available. Before she slept she tended to her flank wound as best she could and slept with dreams full of her failures.

Over a week since she entered the Ruins she came across her first obstacle. The brackish river that cut through the Ruins. So close to the Lightweaver’s Laugh- the name of the falls, called thus for it was said the sound of its cascade reminded Light dragons of the Lightweaver’s laugh- the river ran swift and deep, scoring the land deeply. Johanna wasn’t strong enough to fly even this gap and there was no way she could swim across such a current. To even do so was ludicrous. She’d only heard of some of the oldest Water dragons even attempting to swim around the mouth of Lightweaver’s Laugh. All others were swept along with the tide and tossed out into the open air for a nearly mile-long plunge down into the Sea below. Plenty of time to get your wings under you but Johanna didn’t have the strength for either.

That led to one option. She’d have to go up the river until it mellowed out and became calmer and hopefully a bit more shallow so she could more easily cross it. With a heavy sigh, she headed east, towards the sun. Her going was slow enough that it took her several days to reach a part in the river where the river was nearly level with the ground. She knew she was nowhere near the rim and she’d have to cut across the rest of the Ruins diagonally before reaching the Shifting Expanse. It was unwise for dragons to travel the desert without the aid of a Lightning clan’s dragon.

But the river was wider now but she could tell not much deeper. She didn’t want to go too much further east. She could see the haze of the Hewn City in the distance and she didn’t fancy getting caught up in that. The only problem with this wide, slow, river was that it had turned into a swamp and Johanna stood on some of the only dry land she could see. She’d have to walk and swim through this muck. There was nothing for it. If she wanted to make it to the Plateau she’d have to cross the river and do so while also avoiding the Hewn City. Of course, if she thought about it for a moment the Hewn City was probably a better place to go since Light clans often set up their lairs around the Hewn City to explore and study the strange phenomena, not to mention investigate all the rumors of monsters and such that dwelled within it. But she didn’t. She was focused on getting back to the Plateau and the ancestral home of House Gold Feather.

She waded into the water. At first it only came up to her belly. Then it grew deeper as she went and she had to swim. She was exhausted by the time she’d crossed the main river. The water had looked so calm but its currents had still been rather brisk and it had been a workout to not get swept away. Coming out of the water she startled a nest of psyworms that hissed at her but she managed to flap her wings at them and kick up enough wind to fling them backward. They raced away squeaking in rage. That dealt with she collapsed just beyond the swamp bank. Her wound ached. It no longer bled but it still hurt deeply.

Exhausted she passed out under a dogwood tree.

She was woken with a start by the most anguished wail. Her head shot up and she looked around, trying to find the source of the noise. A pang gripped her heart. It sounded like the youngest children of the old Dragonlord before those Crumbled scum had butchered them. She pushed herself to her feet and stumbled through the island’s underbrush towards the noise. She crossed the island, which was larger than she anticipated, and came upon a greater body of water. The sun was starting to set by now and the light fading but not even that could hide the sight before her. Out in the water was a truly _massive_ bald cypress tree. Surrounding it was a ring of smaller but still large cypress trees and then a forest of mangroves and smaller cypress trees and saplings. Johanna couldn’t see past the canopy but the fact that there were trees there meant the water wasn’t _too_ deep and she needed to get over there. The wails were coming from beyond the tree-line.

With a surprising amount of energy she splashed into the water and found it came up only to the base of her neck so she could walk through the murky water. She kicked up a fair amount of sediment on her way and if she cared to look back she’d see it shift in a way that belayed there was more there than just water. Once at the main tree-line of mangroves that extended east she grabbed the branches and hauled herself up onto the canopy with a tired groan. The mud tried to hold onto her feet but she was insistent. The canopy was easier going than the water and she clambered through the branches with only a bit of strain. More than one pair of eyes watched her from the water’s surface.

“Oh Windsinger’s gale,” she huffed when she saw what lay on the other side of the ring of trees. It was a great, sandy bowl in the water where at the center was a large rocky opening from which fresh water poured. Rising up from the sand on one side and sort of cupping the spring was the roots and trunk of the massive bald cypress. It from within she could hear the pitiful sounds which were now much softer but still were like a fist around her heart. She hadn’t been able to help those Rhodes children but she could help this one! She didn’t fancy a swim in the spring water. Usually swamp springs like this were icy.

Johanna tested her wings. Could she make the short flight? It was only a hundred or so feet. She could make it. She could do it. She steadied herself on the highest branches of one of the shorter cypress trees and launched herself into the air. She grunted in pain as her not fully healed wing strained to catch the wind but she did. She only needed three flaps before she could glide the rest of the way and landed as best she could on the great trunk, clinging to the side like a gecko. Now, where was that baby? She looked around and her antenna twitched. She couldn’t feel anything. That was impossible.

Clambering around the trunk Johanna looked for the source the continued whimpering. She could pick up nothing empathetically from her gem even when she tried very hard and it infuriated her. She climbed down towards the roots and found a part of the tree that had been dug out by some animal to make a natural little den with access to the water and the spring. Johanna had to get a bit wet to gain access to it and she was right! The spring water was freezing! Ignoring the chill she clambered into the den which was several times larger than her and came face to face with the source of the noise.

She’d been expecting a whimpering child. Instead, she found a young adult Guardian, easily twice her size, with big pale green eyes and salty tear tracks partially dried on her face and hanging as little droplets off her facial fins. Her brown hide was covered in rosette patterns and her green wings carried the rare butterfly motif. But the oddest of all was her belly and stomach spine. It seemed almost hollow and filled with a pastel nebula. Johanna had never seen a genetic mutation like that before and she had seen many. But none of that mattered. What mattered was this poor thing seemed to be in great pain.

“Are you alright? Are you hurt?” Johanna asked, moving closer to her. The guardian jerked away, pulling back and away from Johanna fearfully, to press up against the back of the small hollow of a den they’d found. Made? “It’s okay. I’m not going to hurt you,” Johanna said gently as her gem started glowing gently to offer soothing feelings. It either didn’t help or had no effect because it didn’t seem to make the Guardian any less distressed. “Don’t be afraid, I won’t hurt you,” she reached out a claw and gently put it on the Guardian’s arm.

She expected it to be snatched away or for them to lash out. Instead, they just looked down at Johanna’s claw and then up at her with wide eyes. “Y-you’re real?” she asked in a small voice.

“Yes. I’m real,” Johanna said gently. “I’m very real. Are you alright? I heard you.”

The Guardian looked away, shaking her head, blinking hard, looking at the wall. It looked like she saw something here but made no mention of it. “No,” she said and looked at Johanna with wide eyes, her pupils little pricks in her eyes. She looked very scared.

“I’m Johanna,” she said and hopped a bit closer, taking the Guardian’s claw in both of hers. “What’s your name?”

“Name?” She got a far off look in her eyes like she needed to remember. “[Layali](http://flightrising.com/main.php?p=lair&id=332919&tab=dragon&did=35135530),” she said. “Are you sure you’re real?” she asked nervously.

“Yes. I’m real, you don’t have to be afraid. You aren’t alone now,” she said soothingly and tried to project some soothing empathetic feelings. Layali didn’t seem affected by them.

“I’m not?”

“No. I’m here now,” she found herself saying. What was she saying? She was supposed to be crossing the swamp to get back to the rim and eventually the Plateau. But looking into Layali’s Wind green eyes she knew that wouldn’t be happening. Her House didn’t need her; Anastasia ran it just fine without her. The Clan didn’t need her; there were other, younger, generals to lead their paladins into battle. The Dragonlord didn’t need her… didn’t _want_ her. This poor young thing needed her, needed a kind soul in an empty swamp where she was alone.

“You are?” Layali asked, afraid still but more in disbelief than anything.

“Yes,” Johanna said kindly. “Now why don’t you tell me what’s wrong?” Layali just shook her head, her neck swaying back and forth. “Alright, then we can just sit here, together. Whatever had you screaming won’t hurt you while I’m here.”

“You don’t know that,” Layali whispered.

“I’m a paladin,” Johanna said, lifting her head regally. “Nothing gets by me.”

Layali’s lips curled up a bit. She nodded. “Okay. That sounds good.” She lifted her off side wing. “This is my brother,[Rahab](http://flightrising.com/main.php?p=lair&tab=dragon&id=332919&did=35135531),” she said. Johanna looked at the thing and wasn’t sure what to make of it. It didn’t look like a dragon really. It looked almost like a brilliant tropical fish with legs and huge draconic eyes in a little head. Then their head frills moved and she realized with shock that it was a _fae_. But it didn’t have any wings. Rather they’d become decorative fins that could be used to propel them through water but were flimsy out of the water and useless for flight. “We’ve been here alone a long time.”

Johanna tore her eyes away from the wretch of a fae. What was _wrong_ with it? “Well, you aren’t alone now. Now you have me,” she said firmly.

Layali dipped her head low. “Thank you,” she whispered so softly, almost a whimper. “Thank you for coming to us, Johanna,” and she started crying again. Johanna just took her head in her arms and held it, shushing her gently and petting her along the top of the head. She stayed like that well after night fell and darkness gathered around them.


End file.
